As we are pacing the maternity ward, waiting patiently for our 2016 Winter 'Astronomy' Litter to join our mischief. I decided it was time to make some more fleece covers for the DCN and TCN. We often use the large binder clips when we start to get frayed covers or just to lazy to stitch more, but find that having them stitched is really so much quicker in the long run.

Up until this point I was pinning all of them then sewing a batch. I find that since they do occasionally get chewed up, it is more time effective for me to hand stitch a batch really quick. There does not need to be a lot of stitches to hold it together, and if you can sew on a button you can totally do this! If you are not able to sew a button - consider this idea with safety pins instead of the thread (this was how we first did it!)

The example below, is the same for all shelves and pans for the Critter Nations, and will work for any other cage that has inserts. I have chosen to use the pan with the cut out for the example because that is the only different or 'tricky' part. (See Step 6)

Make sure you have 2-4" around the edges in extra material

Fold up the bottom edge

Fold over the side edge then stitch a couple X's in the top middle corner where all the fabric meets. You can tack both edges on each corner but I find it unnecessary. This will hold it enough to last SEVERAL washes or rattie destruction - which ever comes first.

Rotate the pan, fold and stitch the same as the end

Now that you are at the cut out. Make sure the fabric is the same 2-4" around the edge. Cut a diagonal line to the corner of the cut out.

Continue with folding over the edges and stitching the corner (just like the last three.

This is the final corner. You are almost done! Finish it off with a few X's. Then flip it over!

IF you are not able to sew - safety pins work great! If you would rather sew with your machine to make it "Oh so beautiful!" under the pans instead of stitching you would pin the pan then remove and sew with the machine.

After all that I was able to cut and stitch a good batch of them for the next few months.

Here is our mid level of the TCN. We have a plastic lid cut in the back to keep the boys from marking our wall or kicking litter dust and poop behind the cage.

8 beautiful lil pips(squeaks) were born yesterday at 6:30 in the morning.

Today they are one day old, weigh 6-8 grams. We have 2 dark eyes, 6 will most likely have red/ruby like mama. Yesterday we did a quick sexing and had 3 boys 3 girls and 2 were swollen. So they got a ?? Today we did another quick sex check and we may have 4 girls, 3 boys and 1 ? (I like to wait until they have nipples showing to confirm for sure.) Tomorrow I will start separating 'boys' from 'girls' for pictures. Here is a link to their facebook album.

Mama is doing wonderful. She is down to 356 grams after delivery.

​For fun, I posted these lists on facebook. I am letting several others vote on their favorite names out of these lists.

As many of you know, we nickname our litters. We do this because it is easier for us to remember fun names vs L0216M4 (litter month, year, sex, number) Since we have 8 babies we immediately picked our 8 favorite astronomy themed names for each sex. (We had 18 each originally lol) We will register these ratties with their nicknames along with what the adopters want to call them (if they choose to rename them). For example our first female on the wait list - they want to call her Freya. After research we came up with Freya's Morning Star. Kind of extra special because that girl's great grandma had the name Freya.